The Duel at Silver Creek | |
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Directed by | Don Siegel |
Screenplay by | Gerald Drayson Adams Joseph Hoffman |
Story by | Gerald Drayson Adams |
Produced by | Leonard Goldstein |
Starring | Stephen McNally Audie Murphy Faith Domergue |
Cinematography | Irving Glassberg |
Edited by | Russell F. Schoengarth |
Music by | Herman Stein (uncredited) Joseph Gershenson (musical direction) |
Color process | Technicolor |
Production company | Universal Pictures |
Distributed by | Universal Pictures |
Release dates |
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Running time | 77 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Box office | $1.25 million (US rentals) [1] |
The Duel at Silver Creek is a 1952 American Western film directed by Don Siegel; his first film in the Western genre. It starred Stephen McNally, Audie Murphy and Faith Domergue. [2] It was the first time Murphy had appeared in a film where he played a character who was good throughout the movie. [3] The working titles of the film were Claim Jumpers and Hair Trigger Kid. [4]
Luke Cromwell, aka the "Silver Kid" (Audie Murphy), loses his father to mining claim jumpers. He is deputised by Marshal Lightning Tyrone (Stephen McNally) of Silver City, who wants to defeat the claim jumpers. The two men fall for different women, Tyrone for the treacherous Opal Lacey (Faith Domergue), who is secretly in league with the claim jumpers, and Cromwell with tomboy Dusty Fargo (Susan Cabot) who pursues Lightning. [5]
“The damaged, vulnerable hero and the anti-hero are facets in the same persona and cannot be separated, even when the harm is physical as in The Duel at Silver Creek. The issue of vulnerability, of the complementary nature of good and evil, is central to the comprehension of Seigel’s films.—Biographer Judith M. Kass in Don Seigel: The Hollywood Professionals, Volume 4 (1975) [6]
Quentin Tarantino called The Duel at Silver Creek "a very well conceived and executed picture, as well as being obviously a Siegel picture." [7]
Film critic Judith M. Kass remarks that Audie Murphy is “ludicrously attired in black leather, like a Western The Wild One (1953).” [8]
The Duel at Silver Creek dramatizes the perils of personal isolation and infirmity, conditions likely to prove fatal to the forces of evil. Film critic Judith M. Kass writes:
In this movie, solitude is equated with vulnerability in a straightforward manner. When Murphy, on an errand, leaves his father alone, the old man is shot by bandits. Domergue strangles a wounded oldster when entrusted with nursing him. Alone with McNally, Domergue vamps him into forgetting his job…In a sense, McNally’s gun had abandons him by becoming lame after an injury, leaving him more open to assault. [9]
Audie Leon Murphy was an American soldier, actor, and songwriter. He was one of the most decorated American combat soldiers of World War II. He received every military combat award for valor available from the United States Army, as well as French and Belgian awards for heroism. Murphy received the Medal of Honor for valor that he demonstrated at the age of 19 for single-handedly holding off a company of German soldiers for an hour at the Colmar Pocket in France in January 1945, before leading a successful counterattack while wounded and out of ammunition.
Charley Varrick is a 1973 American neo-noir crime film directed by Don Siegel and starring Walter Matthau, Andrew Robinson, Joe Don Baker and John Vernon. Charley Varrick was based on the novel The Looters by John H. Reese and is the first of four consecutive films Matthau appeared in that were not comedies.
The Beguiled is a 1971 American Southern Gothic psychological thriller film directed by Don Siegel, starring Clint Eastwood, Geraldine Page and Elizabeth Hartman. The script was written by Albert Maltz and is based on the 1966 novel written by Thomas P. Cullinan, originally titled A Painted Devil. The film marks the third of five collaborations between Siegel and Eastwood, following Coogan's Bluff (1968) and Two Mules for Sister Sara (1970), and continuing with Dirty Harry (1971) and Escape from Alcatraz (1979).
The Killers, released in the UK as Ernest Hemingway's "The Killers", is a 1964 American neo noir crime film. Written by Gene L. Coon and directed by Don Siegel, it is the second Hollywood adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's 1927 short story of the same name, following the 1946 version.
Stephen McNally was an American actor remembered mostly for his appearances in many Westerns and action films. He often played hard-hearted characters, criminals, bullies, and other villains.
The Big Steal is a 1949 American black-and-white film noir reteaming Out of the Past stars Robert Mitchum and Jane Greer. The film was directed by Don Siegel, based on the short story "The Road to Carmichael's" by Richard Wormser.
Two Mules for Sister Sara is a 1970 American-Mexican Western film in Panavision directed by Don Siegel and starring Shirley MacLaine set during the French intervention in Mexico (1861–1867). The film was to have been the first in a five-year exclusive association between Universal Pictures and Sanen Productions of Mexico. It was the second of five collaborations between Siegel and Eastwood, following Coogan's Bluff (1968). The collaboration continued with The Beguiled and Dirty Harry and finally Escape from Alcatraz (1979).
Madigan is a 1968 American neo-noir crime drama thriller film directed by Don Siegel and starring Richard Widmark, Henry Fonda and Inger Stevens.
Private Hell 36 is a 1954 American crime film noir directed by Don Siegel starring Ida Lupino, Steve Cochran, Howard Duff, Dean Jagger and Dorothy Malone.
Faith Marie Domergue was an American film and television actress. Discovered at age 16 by media and aircraft mogul Howard Hughes, she was signed to a contract with Hughes's RKO Radio Pictures and cast as the lead in the studio's thriller Vendetta, which had a troubled four-year production before finally being released in 1950.
The Lineup is a 1958 American film noir version of the police procedural television series of the same title that ran on CBS radio from 1950 until 1953, and on CBS television from 1954 until 1960. The film was directed by Don Siegel. It features a number of scenes shot on location in San Francisco during the late 1950s, including shots of the Embarcadero Freeway, the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, the War Memorial Opera House, the Mark Hopkins Hotel, and Sutro Baths.
Hell Is for Heroes is a 1962 American war film directed by Don Siegel and starring Steve McQueen. It tells the story of a squad of U.S. soldiers from the 95th Infantry Division who, in the fall of 1944, must hold off an entire German company for approximately 48 hours along the Siegfried Line until reinforcements reach them.
Riot in Cell Block 11 is a 1954 American film noir crime film directed by Don Siegel and starring Neville Brand, Emile Meyer, Frank Faylen, Leo Gordon and Robert Osterloh. Director Quentin Tarantino called it "the best prison film ever made."
Baby Face Nelson is a 1957 American film noir crime film based on the real-life 1930s gangster, directed by Don Siegel, co-written by Daniel Mainwaring—who also wrote the screenplay for Siegel's 1956 sci-fi thriller Invasion of the Body Snatchers—and starring Mickey Rooney, Carolyn Jones, Cedric Hardwicke, Leo Gordon as Dillinger, Anthony Caruso, Jack Elam, John Hoyt and Elisha Cook Jr.
Night unto Night is a 1949 American drama film directed by Don Siegel and written by Kathryn Scola. It is based on the 1944 novel by Philip Wylie. The film stars Ronald Reagan, Viveca Lindfors, Broderick Crawford, Rosemary DeCamp, Osa Massen and Art Baker. The film was released by Warner Bros. on June 10, 1949.
No Time for Flowers is a 1952 American romantic comedy film directed by Don Siegel and starring Viveca Lindfors and Paul Christian and Ludwig Stössel.
Count the Hours! is a 1953 crime film noir directed by Don Siegel, featuring Macdonald Carey, Teresa Wright, John Craven, and Jack Elam.
China Venture is a 1953 American adventure war film directed by Don Siegel. The plot concerns an American patrol sent into South China during World War II to rescue an important prisoner held by Chinese guerrillas.
Stranger on the Run is a 1967 American made-for-television Western film directed by Don Siegel and starring Henry Fonda, Anne Baxter and Michael Parks. In some countries it premiered in cinemas.
Hell Bent for Leather is a 1960 American CinemaScope Western film directed by George Sherman and starring Audie Murphy, Felicia Farr, Stephen McNally and Robert Middleton. The film was based on the 1959 novel Outlaw Marshal by Ray Hogan and filmed on location in the Alabama Hills of Lone Pine, California.